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Microsoft Defender for Cloud vs Microsoft Defender for IoT comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Microsoft Defender for Cloud
Ranking in Microsoft Security Suite
3rd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
74
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (7th), Container Management (8th), Container Security (4th), Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) (3rd), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) (3rd), Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) (4th), Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) (3rd), Compliance Management (2nd)
Microsoft Defender for IoT
Ranking in Microsoft Security Suite
32nd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
IoT Security (5th), Operational Technology (OT) Security (6th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2025, in the Microsoft Security Suite category, the mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Cloud is 7.3%, down from 12.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Defender for IoT is 0.2%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Microsoft Security Suite
 

Featured Reviews

Vibhor Goel - PeerSpot reviewer
A single tool for complete visibility and addressing security gaps
Currently, issues are structured in Microsoft Defender for Cloud at severity levels of high, critical, or warning, but these severity levels are not always right. For example, Microsoft might consider a port being open as critical, but that might not be the case for our company. Similarly, it might suggest closing some management ports, but you might need them to be able to log in, so the severity levels for certain things can be improved. Even though Microsoft Defender for Cloud provides a way to temporarily disable certain alerts or notifications without affecting our security score, it would be better to have more granularized control over these recommendations. Currently, we cannot even disable certain alerts or notifications. There should be an automated mechanism to design Azure policies based on the recommendations, possibly with AI integration. Instead of an engineer having to write a policy to fix security gaps, which is very time-consuming, there should be an inbuilt capability to auto-remediate everything and have proper control in place. Additionally, enabling Defender for Cloud at the resource group level, rather than only at the subscription level, would be beneficial.
William Tuleja - PeerSpot reviewer
Integration with existing tools boosts management efficiency
The only improvement I see is that some detection explanations are vaguely provided by Microsoft, resulting in generic IoT detections that alert me to an issue yet don't specify what's wrong. Often, it just links back to a generic KB article without additional information. When it happens, it requires extra detective work. This issue doesn't occur often but can be annoying.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"The most valuable feature is the comprehensive overview across different workloads. It allows us to see protection not just across one workload, such as virtual machines, containers, infrastructure, or data, but across all our workloads. This overall visibility is really helpful."
"The dashboard is very good. It gives our clients a lot of information and allows them to have a complete overview of the system. Everything is visible in one glance."
"The most valuable features of the solution are the insights, meaning the remediation suggestions, as well as the incident alerts."
"It has seamless integration with any of the services I mentioned, on Azure, such as IaaS platforms, virtual machines, applications, or databases, because it's an in-house product from Microsoft within the Azure ecosystem."
"Microsoft Defender for Cloud has improved our security poster by at least 100 percent."
"I find Microsoft Defender for Cloud's KQL very flexible and powerful. It's really easy to search through with KQL queries to find the security breaches and incidents and to track down the breach itself."
"One important security feature is the incident alerts. Now, with all these cyberattacks, there are a lot of incident alerts that get triggered. It is very difficult to keep monitoring everything automatically, instead our organization is utilizing the automated use case that we get from Microsoft. That has helped bring down the manual work for a lot of things."
"The pricing is good."
"It is manageable and integrates with other Microsoft products, which is crucial for me."
"I believe it is best suited for cloud services and is unmatched by other cloud security solutions."
"Mainly, it is manageable and integrates with other Microsoft products, which is crucial for me."
"I find Microsoft Defender very effective in vulnerability management and it provides good attack reduction, making it a next-generation protection solution."
 

Cons

"The product was a bit complex to set up earlier, however, it is a bit streamlined now."
"Microsoft Defender could be more centralized. For example, I still need to go to another console to do policy management."
"Agent features need to be improved. They support agents through Azure Arc or Workbench. Sometimes, we are not able to get correct signals from the machines on which we have installed these agents. We are not able to see how many are currently reporting to Azure Security Center, and how many are currently not reporting. For example, we have 1,000 machines, and we have enrolled 1,000 OMS agents on these machines to collect the log. When I look at the status, even though at some places, it shows that it is connected, but when I actually go and check, I'm not getting any alerts from those. There are some discrepancies on the agent, and the agent features are not up to the mark."
"I rate Microsoft support five out of 10. It gets better once you're escalated past the first and second levels. It's difficult to get the necessary support when tickets are first opened."
"We would like to have better transparency as to how the security score is calculated because as it is now, it is difficult to understand."
"It's hard to reach someone who understands my problems. I haven't had many issues, so I haven't called them."
"From a compliance standpoint, they can include some more metrics and some specific compliances such as GDPR."
"The most significant areas for improvement are in the security of our identity and endpoints and the posture of the cloud environment. Better protection for our cloud users and cloud apps is always welcome."
"The only improvement I see is that some detection explanations are vaguely provided by Microsoft, resulting in generic IoT detections that alert me to an issue yet don't specify what's wrong."
"The primary area that needs improvement is compatibility with the latest IoT technologies."
"Customer service and support from Microsoft are costly. The execution by engineers is expensive, and the service is neither free nor toll-free, making it less accessible for customers."
"The only improvement I see is that some detection explanations are vaguely provided by Microsoft, resulting in generic IoT detections that alert me to an issue yet don't specify what's wrong."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product's pricing policy is generally favorable."
"The licensing cost per server is $15 per month."
"Pricing is difficult because each license has its own metrics and cost."
"Azure Defender is a bit pricey. The price could be lower."
"Its pricing is a little bit high in terms of Azure Security Center, but the good thing is that we don't need to maintain and deploy it. So, while the pricing is high, it is native to Azure which is why we prefer using this tool."
"Defender's basic version is free, which is good. Many of our teams are evaluating the paid version against third-party products."
"They have a free version, but the license for this one isn't too high. It's free to start with, and you're charged for using it beyond 30 days. Some other pieces of Defender are charged based on usage, so you will be charged more for a high volume of transactions. I believe Defender for Cloud is a daily charge based on Azure's App Service Pricing."
"The pricing model for most plans is generally good, but the cost of the new Defender for Storage plan is high and should be revisited, as it could lead to disabling desirable security features due to cost."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
7%
Manufacturing Company
17%
Computer Software Company
16%
Energy/Utilities Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

How is Prisma Cloud vs Azure Security Center for security?
Azure Security Center is very easy to use, integrates well, and gives very good visibility on what is happening across your ecosystem. It also has great remote workforce capabilities and supports a...
What do you like most about Microsoft Defender for Cloud?
The entire Defender Suite is tightly coupled, integrated, and collaborative.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Defender for Cloud?
The licensing is straightforward but can become expensive if you cover everything. You must balance the cost against the importance of what needs covering.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Defender for IoT?
The solution is relatively expensive with licensing being based on each device. The cost per license might not be affordable for every organization, and I would rate it around six out of ten on a s...
What needs improvement with Microsoft Defender for IoT?
The primary area that needs improvement is compatibility with the latest IoT technologies. Microsoft needs flexibility to ensure good compatibility with new IoT solutions, which frequently introduc...
What is your primary use case for Microsoft Defender for IoT?
My primary use case for Microsoft Defender for IoT is security. It helps with vulnerability management and provides significant attack reduction. It functions as a next-generation protection soluti...
 

Also Known As

Microsoft Azure Security Center, Azure Security Center, Microsoft ASC, Azure Defender
Azure Defender for IoT
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Microsoft Defender for Cloud is trusted by companies such as ASOS, Vatenfall, SWC Technology Partners, and more.
Information Not Available
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